The Importance of Monitoring for the Effectiveness of Environmental DirectivesA Comparison of Monitoring Obligations in European Environmental Directives

European environmental directives contain various norms and standards, such as quality standards or emission standards. The goal of these directives is often to improve the environmental quality and the protection of biodiversity and ecosystems, to be achieved by Member States by complying with these norms. However, in order to ensure that they will do so, many directives contain additional instruments, such as the obligation to set up action programmes and an obligation to monitor and report the results to the European Commission. These obligations are essential for directives to be effective, but the form and contents of these obligations tend to differ. Some directives contain strict norms with detailed information on when and where to monitor, whereas other directives leave the Member States much more freedom. This article will focus on the monitoring obligations in European environmental directives, their objectives and the different designs.